


Praveśaka

by avani



Category: Baahubali (Movies)
Genre: F/M, Flirting, Missing Scene, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-24
Updated: 2017-05-24
Packaged: 2018-11-02 17:06:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,837
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10948950
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/avani/pseuds/avani
Summary: From hushed whispers and half-understood songs, Devasena formed the idea that infatuation was an intoxicant, dulling the senses and slowing the mind, but she has never felt more thoroughly herself before.





	Praveśaka

Devasena wakes to birdsong. 

From hushed whispers and half-understood songs, she formed the idea that infatuation was an intoxicant, dulling the senses and slowing the mind, but she has never felt more thoroughly herself before. The sunlight is brighter, the incense from last night's Krishna puja more pungent, the bedcurtains silken against her fingers when she pulls them apart. 

It is not displeasing. 

Sumitra, clever Sumitra, sees it first, warning her as they walked back to the ladies’ quarters. “The princess’ lullaby will be all over the palace by dawn,” she teases. “My brother will be heartbroken.” 

“It wasn’t him I meant to hear me,” Devasena retorts and feels a twinge of regret. Despite it all, she is fond of Kumar Varma, has been ever since he was a lanky thirteen-year-old whose honor she had to defend from the taunts and blows of the other palace children. But that hardly means she wants to marry him. Perhaps this might be the kindest way to direct his feelings elsewhere, or at least to hint him that they might not be returned.  

She’s contemplating this when Sumitra’s voice breaks through her thoughts again:"Have you spoken to your brother?" 

In a battle a warrior's greatest disadvantage is to betray weakness. It is this that keeps Devasena's gait unhurried and her face smooth. "There's nothing to say," she lies, reaching to pluck a remaining jasmine bud from her sister-in-law's hair. 

Sumitra only raises an eyebrow. "Would it be so bad if there were?" 

At that Devasena does stumble. Ever generous, Sumitra ignores her and goes on: "A harmless flirtation is not the worst mistake a princess could make, and in most cases, any mistake at all. If only you knew the suitors I had before your brother came calling-- but that doesn't matter. What matters is that with any luck, after this is all over, you might let go of your hard-headedness and agree to choose a groom at last." 

Which leaves her here and now, burdened with her sister-in-law's blessing to play this game of wits with her stranger to its end -- and who's to say he won't tire of it before she does? For all she knows, she will wake up to find him gone one morning, returned to wherever he came from, and she will have lost nothing. 

Satisfied, Devasena rises. 

In the next room Lakshmi and Akhila and Madhavi are still asleep, but she does not pause to wake them. Her heightened awareness brings with it a restlessness, a need to take action of any sort. 

When she reaches the door, her stranger is on the other side. 

He straightens. She can see he must not have been expecting her presence so early. If he had, doubtless his omnipresent uncle would be there to keep him from betraying himself more than he already does. Good. Let him be caught off balance, as he does her so often; she tries to keep the corners of her mouth from turning up in triumph. 

He recovers quickly. "For you, Crown Princess," he says, brandishing a tray of ashoka flowers in her direction, "with the compliments of Kumar Varma." 

As lies go, it's not bad. Showering her with flowers is entirely the sort of uncomplicated wooing Kumar would attempt — at least he would if he realized she preferred simple, sweet ashoka blooms to roses and lotuses. She doesn’t think anyone has. He must have made a lucky guess indeed, her stranger — unsurprising, given that this is clearly a man who Fortune favors. 

But it would have been more convincing still if he hadn't forgotten his stammer again. Or if his eyes focused anywhere other than her face, the better to gauge her reaction. 

Devasena refuses to offer him that pleasure. "That tray must be heavy," she murmurs, all kindness and consideration, "especially with your shoulder." 

He rocks backwards on his heels. "M-Much better, Crown Princess. I thank you." 

"Please," Devasena continues, merciless. "I would be so much more at ease if I could see for myself. I'm hardly a physician, but I do know something about caring for wounds." 

She considers taking another step forward, but it isn't necessary. She can already see the resignation in his face. He surrenders the tray; Devasena, determined to be magnanimous in victory, takes it before gesturing for him to hurry up. 

Slowly, he half-turns, gives his arm a perfunctory flex, and looks back at her expectantly. "Good as new, Crown Prince--" 

"Wasn't it your right arm that was injured?" 

"What? Oh. No. My left. C-Certainly it was my left arm." 

Oh, hardly a response worthy of him! "I might remember," she points out. "I was there, after all." 

"Ah, but as the victim, it's my right to judge where and how I was injured at your hands, Crown Princess." He curls his arm back to his chest; his fingers rest against his heart. 

She's always been vulnerable to feints. Devasena presses her lips together, all the more when he grins at her: it's that very grin which betrays his pretense above all else. A fool could smile like that, to be sure, but not with such awareness of its extraordinary effects.  

"You may thank Kumar Varma for his kindness in thinking of me," she says, and finds her stranger grimacing. 

"The prince also requested your presence in the armory this morning," he says very quickly, "to witness the display of his arrows from yesterday's hunt for posterity." 

She's caught between laughter and dismay. "He wasn't serious?" 

He shrugs. "Unfortunately so. Uncle _was_ able to talk him out of posing for a portrait at the same time. Something about how Kumar Varma, Lord of the Bow, should never lower his dignity to be memorialized alongside a brutish beast. Besides, how could a mere picture capture his cleverness, his agility, his fearlessness against all things porcine — " 

As he speaks, Devasena can see the portrait that will never be take shape in her mind: Kumar Varma, eyes wide, holding his bow in precisely the wrong direction as a rage-maddened boar lunges at him from behind. Despite herself, she chuckles, and her stranger swings around, delight in his eyes. 

Her breath catches. 

A warrior should know, too, when it is wisest to retreat from the field of battle rather than fighting on futilely. For once Devasena intends to follow that tenet instead of her own stubbornness. "Thank you," she says, only a shade too soon, "you may tell Kumar I'd be happy to join him." 

She meets his gaze until he nods and disappears down the hallway. That much pride, at least, she has left. 

*

Kumar Varma's impromptu ceremony is every bit as droll as Devasena could have hoped. One instant Kumar preens by his trophies, the better to claim them as an inspiration to the future; the next, he blinks uncertainly at her, as though still incredulous it really happened at all. No bracket is high enough to hold his arrows, no wall drenched in enough sunlight to highlight them among all the weapons displayed. 

The uncle, too, is in fine form, having taken her criticism the previous day only as encouragement to heighten his dramatics, now with her included in the joke. When he retells the story of the hunt, in this version apparently carried out in pitch black darkness while Kumar was blindfolded to boot, Devasena looks over to find her stranger’s broad shoulders shaking with silent laughter. Some instinct leads him to turn, as well, and their gazes meet. She’s relieved to find, behind the amusement, genuine affection for Kumar there; she’s spent too much of her life defending Kumar Varma from the slights of others to tolerate anything else. 

Not that it should matter. In a few days, her stranger will be gone, and Kumar Varma will remain. She can protect him as much as she wants then, even for the rest of her life, if she so chooses. She looks away. 

The ceremony concludes at last, and she turns to find him looking at a model on the far end of the hall in apparent confusion. 

”Bhaskara’s wheel,” she says, approaching without entirely meaning to. “A model of it, at least, that the King of Ujjain sent my father years ago. They say it’s meant to roll on forever.” 

”I've seen one like it in Ujjain,” her stranger replies, distracted. His hands are clenched behind his back: a servant’s pose, as incongruous on him as his facade of cowardice. She wonders if he only holds them so to resist reaching for the model. She wonders if he ever keeps his hands so around her. “What I can’t make out is how it can keep on moving under its own power…” 

She raises her chin. “I remember it working better in my father’s day,” she says brusquely. “See what you can make of it in your free time.” 

His eyes widen, before they crinkle again with amusement and appreciation. Devasena nods once, and exits with as much dignity as she can, doing her best to ignore the quiet giggles of her ladies-in-waiting behind her. 

*

By afternoon, her restlessness has only worsened. She seeks out Madhav, to find out if there are any other reports of wild animals trampling fields, or raiders racing across the borders. He only laughs. 

“These days, Crown Princess, a woman can travel the breadth of Kuntala unescorted by guards without fear of attacks. They say any bandits who remain are too frightened that she might be Princess Devasena in disguise. And if battle-hardened men fear to cross you, why shouldn’t beasts of the forest as well?” 

She supposes she ought to be gratified, or at least remind her brother that her purpose in carrying out her raids incognito was successful. Instead she only feels disappointment; Kuntala, so large and overwhelming to govern when she was eight and her brother sixteen, now seems as drab and constricting as a blouse she’s long outgrown. Devasena loves Kuntala with every last corner of her heart; her chest aches for something more. “What of our neighbors, Prime Minister?” she asks. She might as well finish the job. 

But he shakes his head as well. “Singapuram respects our treaties, cutthroats though they are. The Chalukyas would rather make great temples to the gods than war. And Mahishmati—“ 

He stops abruptly. Devasena doesn’t blame him. As long as she can remember, Mahishmati has crouched to their north, a lion with a gaping maw eager to swallow the swan of Kuntala into its empire. Her country’s saving grace has been Mahishmati’s inability to keep from turning its claws against itself, a new civil war seeming to break out every few years until the Queen Mother took power and blessedly seemed more preoccupied with implementing her iron rule than seeking new lands to conquer. Except now, word came south that a new king was to be crowned, young and ambitious: exactly the sort that would take notice of Kuntala once more. Exactly the sort that would mean Kuntala’s doom. 

And what nonsense, too, to worship him so blindly just for defeating the Kalakeya horde! Better, Devasena thinks, to celebrate the man who rallied his fellows when all hope was gone. Better to admire him who made sure the ravages of war didn’t affect the innocent. Better to love him who fought to protect the ones he loved. 

But all of this is as known to Madhav and the Prime Minister as it is to her; she sees no need to rob them of their joy and ease simply because of her disquiet. “A few days, then, of peace,” Devasena says instead, with her best attempt at a smile, and leaves them to their contentment.

* 

He comes to her in the morning. 

It’s hardly an assignation: the Princess of Kuntala is by no means the only one who enjoys watching the sun rise from the eastern wall, even if her ladies-in-waiting do not accompany her, even if the nearest thing to a chaperone they have is a sleepy soldier looking in the opposite direction. Even if it is, Devasena doesn’t care - her stranger’s face is bright with triumph, and her lips turn upward in response. 

“It’s the mercury,” he announces as he approaches, taking her hands into his own. “It’s attached to the spokes of the wheel, and as the wheel tilts, the mercury tips over, and its weight propels the wheel forward!” 

She laughs. She can’t help it; his exhilaration is infectious. And, she considers, an advantage not to be missed. 

“You said you had seen one in Ujjain,” she murmurs, gaze demurely lowered to their clasped hands. 

Only a flash of white in the periphery of her vision lets her know her words do not pass unnoticed. “I did,” he says. “A pleasant visit. One of the places I most wished to see.” That’s just as well; Ujjain would be quite a journey to have to make from Kuntala and back. 

“A man who doesn’t have the good sense to jump out of the way of an angry bull he won’t fight off can’t have been around many before.” 

He smiles again. His fingers are warm around hers, and as familiar, callouses and all, as her own. “We keep more milk cows in the city. Slower. Sweeter in temper.” 

“Kodumanan?” Devasena asks hopefully. They say the iron foundries there craft the best swords to be found in all the world, and she's always wanted to try one herself. 

“Good wine there,” and he chuckles, perhaps at a personal joke, perhaps because he knows exactly why she wants to see Kodumanan without having to be told, “Not as good as that of Singapuram.” 

She pulls away. _”Singapuram?”_

“I was only there in search of someone,” he adds hurriedly. “It wasn’t for long.” 

Devasena refuses to be pacified. “I hadn’t heard that Singapuram ever hosted anyone except thieves and murderers.” She considers. “And ladies of low repute.” 

“They’re really much friendlier once you get to know them.” 

“Especially the ladies of low repute?” she retorts, and he shrugs. 

It’s strange; all the romances her ladies-in-waiting so read feature heroines who would descend into incoherent jealousy at such provocation, leaving their unfortunate lovers to trail behind them babbling apologies. Devasena feels no such impulse. It’s enough to know he couldn’t possibly look at any other woman the way he is looking at her now. It’s enough to know no one has looked at her in such a way before. She never wants to look away. 

“Devasena,” he says, voice deeper than before, as though she is always _Devasena_ to him and never _Crown Princess_ , before reaching for her hands once more. He’s done nothing but clear his throat, apparently wondering where to begin, when she hears footsteps from the stairs to the wall. By the time Madhav reaches the last step, she is standing at the edge, blindly looking down at the green lands below, while her stranger stands a respectable distance behind, awaiting further instruction. 

“Crown Princess!” blurts Madhav once he sees her. “Forgive me for intruding, but I bring two messages for you. Firstly, a tree’s fallen on the road up to the mountain dam. The villagers request that a few men be spared from the palace to help them move it.” 

Devasena considers. Truthfully she prefers the challenge of a fight or a hunt to simple labor, but any service to her people is her duty. “We can ride out at once, Madhav, if you’ll let the regiment know—“ 

“Unfortunately not,” Madhav says. “That’s part of the problem. The King’s called for you at once. There’s a ship in harbor, with dignitaries’ flags, and he desires your presence when he receives them.” 

Suffering through endless negotiations: that too is a sacrifice for Kuntala she must make. “Very well,” she says, and gestures behind her. “Take him instead.” 

“M-me, C-Crown Princess?” 

“You,” she says, without looking back. Let him have his fun, even if she was bound to more onerous tasks. “Though I would appreciate it if you didn’t come back down the mountain bruised and battered before I can make a guardsman out of you.” 

* 

If she were a superstitious woman, she might believe she brought the visit of the Mahishmati delegation upon herself by taking their name so lightly the day before. Fool that she is, she takes their satisfaction to see her present as simple acknowledgment of her importance in her brother's court; and then they begin their shameful, shocking proposal of marriage and the truth is revealed. 

It isn't over when the ink is dry on her mocking message to the Queen Mother of Mahishmati. Instead, Devasena sits on her throne, cold and angry, while her brother politely offers the delegation dinner and a night's hospitality which the head ambassador just as politely refuses in favor of setting out at once. Gone to report back to their mistress like the loyal dogs they were, Devasena assumes, and barely manages a nod in farewell. 

When the delegation has been dismissed, and their gifts of glinting gold gone with them, Sumitra turns to her. "Perhaps you could have been more diplomatic, Devasena, my dear. If Mahishmati should take offense and choose to retaliate?" 

Her fists are still clenched at her sides. "And if I had agreed to what they said, they would have known that Kuntala was incapable of protecting its own and nothing more than a puppet in their hands. Kuntala is not for sale, and neither am I." 

Sumitra turns to her husband in silent appeal. Jayavarma claps a hand on his sister's shoulder. "I agree with Devasena. I have never known her judgment to steer us wrong, and who knows what ills a marriage with Mahishmati might bring us?" 

Kumar Varma looks entirely too pleased. "I stand with Devasena, too!" he proclaims. "If she doesn't want to marry a prince of Mahishmati, why should she?" 

Sumitra, now entirely outnumbered, falls silent. Devasena supposes her family's support should be a relief, but it does nothing to calm the rage burning inside of her. That has always been her greatest failing: anger, once it has a hold of her, never lets go easily. It hangs on her, heavy as shackles, as she stops by the armory to make sure the ship to Mahishmati carries her sword on board. It traps her, inescapable as any prison cell, as she strolls through the gardens aimlessly, her ladies-in-waiting trailing anxiously behind. 

It's not until it's dark, and her wanderings bring her near the kitchens, that she can think clearly enough to wonder what she is doing here. 

Through the window, she can see a girl, not more than eight or nine years old, trying to use a butter churn clearly too heavy for her and nearly sobbing with the effort. Devasena makes a note to have a word with the head cook — what can he be thinking, setting a child like this such difficult work? But before she can do more than take a decisive step in the direction of the cooks’ quarters, her stranger approaches the girl and gently takes the ropes of the churn away from her. 

A lean down to her height, a quick joke to allay her fears, and an affectionate ruffle of her hair; and the girl is sitting, relieved, while her stranger finishes her chore. Devasena, watching, feels the weight on her shoulders lighten; her steps feel unrestricted and free. 

Devasena turns away. "It's time we retired," she tells her ladies-in-waiting. If she's honest with herself, Devasena knows the sight of him shouldn't bring her such calm. The kitchen girl can at least call him her savior; Devasena has nothing more to offer as explanation but a fondness she is no longer certain she can control. 

* 

The next day, one of her brother's guardsman takes a nasty fall during practice and injures his leg. Her stranger is one of the men who help carry Vasu from the practice fields, and he stays when the others depart. She's glad of it. Vasu's ankle might only be sprained, but the cut on his shin where he landed on his unsheathed sword runs deep. The court physician is busy seeing to a difficult childbirth in one of the neighboring village; Devasena will have to stitch it up herself. Fortunately her stranger doesn't need much in the way of instruction, or at least is no stranger to wounds. When the wine Devasena asked a servant to bring arrives, he helps Vasu gulp as much of it as he can, and when the other man lolls backwards in a stupor, he holds him still while Devasena works as quickly as she can. 

For a time, he lets her work in silence, but then, as she ties off her final stitch: "Neatly done." 

Devasena considers it from another's perspective. "It is good work," she says, too honest to pretend false modesty. "Sumitra will be proud. She might even forgive me yesterday." 

He doesn't ask anything. He doesn't ask anything so pointedly that she feels compelled to add: "I refused another proposal of marriage. She disapproved." 

"Ah." 

"Perhaps not as kindly as I could have. But--" she breaks off, frustrated, seeking the right words. "It is impossible for me to marry a man I do not respect, a man who doesn't respect me. Who doesn't want me as his right hand as he will be mine. Who doesn't want _me_."

 _Who isn't you,_ she does not have to add. It is not the most important thing about yesterday's proposal — Queen Mother Sivagami's careless arrogance still stings at her soul — but it is what she most wants him to know. Mahishmati and its anger is her concern; his should be nothing but answering the challenge she's delivered. 

She binds Vasu's leg in silence. When she looks up at last, her stranger's eyes are wide, as though she has offered him a gift greater than any he would have dreamed of. 

He swallows, says, "Devasena. If — " 

Vasu stirs and opens his eyes blearily. "Crown Princess? Is it over?" 

Devasena forces herself to smile at him. "You were very brave. I expect you to stay off that foot until the royal physician or I tell you otherwise." When he protests, she raises a hand to silence him. "Kuntala is not so desperate for fighting men that she can't spare you the time you need to heal. Now let... _Shivu_ here help you to the barracks, and if I hear you've done anything but rest, you answer to me." 

With a last look in her direction, both men are gone. Devasena tells herself she isn't disappointed. A man needs time, perhaps, to make such an important decision; she can afford him that. But should the next morning dawn with its birdsong and sunlight, without him offering her his surrender or parry — Well. He will leave her no other choice but to claim her victory herself. 

* 

She wakes to the war-gong instead.

**Author's Note:**

> Multiple notes here; feel free to skip over if not interested.
> 
> * praveśaka- Per sanskritdictionary.com: "a kind of interlude (acted by some of the subordinate characters for the making known of what is supposed to have occurred between the acts or the introducing of what is about to follow)" 
> 
> *The gap between "Kanna Nidurinchara" and the Pindari attack is almost certainly 2-3 days, if we use "Hamsa Naava" as an accurate measure of how long it takes to travel between the Kuntala Kingdom and Mahishmati, and taking into account the time needed to for Sivagami's envoy to travel back and forth before the Pindari attack (since Amarendra gets her message by hawk that same night). 
> 
> *Bhaskara's Wheel ([Wikipedia article here!](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bh%C4%81skara%27s_wheel))was a real-life attempt at a perpetual motion machine that sadly, did not actually work. But given that physics are so touch-and-go in the Baahubali universe, I like to imagine that it did in fact achieve its goal in Baahubali-land! The scientist Bhaskara did in fact live in the university city of Ujjain, located in modern-day Madhya Pradesh, near where we speculate the historical Mahishmati Kingdom existed.
> 
> *The Chalukyas were a real-life kingdom in South India. We don't really see much of Kuntala's neighbors other than Singapuram and Mahishmati, so I substituted them here instead of making up my own kingdom. 
> 
> *Kodumanam was a trade city in ancient Tamil Nadu famous for the manufacture of Wootz steel, thought to be the finest in the ancient world. 
> 
> * The name Jayavarma for Devasena's brother comes from IMDB; Sumitra, though, is my own invention since, as far as I'm aware, she is never named in canon or supplemental materials. That said, it's entirely possible I missed something, in which case I'd love for you to let me know!


End file.
